Royalty Sound is the youngest Sound to have graced the ReggaeManiaRadio studio since the inception of Sound System Fridays. This fairly young two man crew, made up of owner/MC Thunder (formerly of Montreal’s King Levi Sound) and DJ Rock Star charged through the doors at a pretty good pace (musically speaking) just a few minutes after 9 PM. They were young, but, eager and judging from their dubs, appeared to have spent some serious money in their one year existence.
Royalty went hard for two consecutive hours delivering Mavado, Sizzla, Luciano, Pinchers, Shabba, Cocoa Tea, Merciless, Bounty Killer and more. Everything seemed to be going well in the early stages of the show. MC Thunder spent a lot of his ‘mic’ time promoting Royalty’s willingness to ‘clash’ any Sound, anytime, anyplace, anywhere – especially LP International (Big Up Polly, Richie and the rest of the crew!).
Clearly, we’re talking about two different ‘leagues’ here, but, you couldn’t tell that to Royalty. Thunder and Rock Star really do believe that they have what it takes to stand up to the mighty LP in a clash despite being a year old. All night, they kept ‘dissing’ PollyFamous The General (formerly of King Klepto) for jumping from one Sound to another and for not owning his own Sound.
From the start, Royalty showed disrespect for Canada’s senior Sounds by constantly referring to them as, yes, “dinosaur” Sounds. It was an interesting strategy on their part, it was clear that they were looking for someone to ‘book’ them on their first ‘official’ clash – their hard work and dedication for the first two hours was almost like a ‘clash’ audition – warmongering ‘n all.
We should note that our ReggaeManiaRadio chat room listeners and viewers usually don’t mind if a Sound brags and boasts or disses other Sounds while showcasing on Sound System Fridays, it’s the Sound clash way, but, they better have the chunes and speech to back it up. This is were Royalty ran into problems…At one point in the broadcast (10:08 PM), Royalty dropped “Odd Ras” (Nah Follow Nobody) – a Chronixx dub. Now, nuff Sounds have dropped this during Sound System Fridays, but, let it play out, Royalty seemed to race through it like it was nothing. Our chat room ‘splice police’ (LOL) wouldn’t give it a pass calling it a “splice” and “carbon” tune.
This accusation distracted MC Thunder (he was keeping abreast of the chat room throughout the night) – which threw him off his game. I found it to be funny, but, Thunder didn’t – he cussed the chat room community using words that I won’t repeat here. He was convinced that the aforementioned comments came from a bunch of badminded soundmen that just have no love for Royalty Sound. Then, PollyFamous called in, supporting the show, but, asking me to personally educate Royalty about playing “splice” and “carbon” chunes.
We asked Royalty to drop the Chronixx dub again later on in the show – that didn’t stop the chat room comments from flooding in – people in the chat room were unforgiving and even more convinced, that the tune in question, was indeed a “splice” tune. Royalty’s feathers were ruffled – near the 11 o’clock mark, they made their situation worse by stating that they would “punish” the people in the chat room by strictly playing 45’s and if you (the listening and viewing audience) wanted to hear more of their dubs, you could ‘book’ them for a ‘clash’ where they would be ‘willing to deliver’. (Thunder later confided that the playing of the 45’s was all part of their plan – they knew that some promoters would be listening and they wanted to show them that they were capable of juggling.
Royalty played a few more dubs before the end of the show, but, the chat room had dun called them out for “running out of tunes”. Big Up the people in the chat room still, but, Sounds can play whatever they want, when they want on Sound System Fridays – you guys ‘n gyals are upping the ante, pressuring the Sounds to play all dub plates. We’ll keep an eye on Royalty and see how they’re doing in a year from now. Next week, the ‘original’ Lexus Supreme hosts Sound System Fridays. Enjoy the Podcast!
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